The Beginning of the End of the First Age
A frigid, driving wind pelts against the tent of the giant wise-woman, made of mottled canvas stitched of a hundred skins from the little creatures that roam this world, carefully pulled together with gut string and bone needle, snapping and rippling against the storm without. She chants an invocation to Kross as she casts the frozen human bones downward onto the ground, reading the signs of how they fall according to an ancient frost magic rite. Her eyes widen as she sees that they have not fallen chaotically, but into an ordered pattern...
A mage in some tiled, polished marble hall of Vasheroth, after decades writing and contemplating the nature and origin of divinity, finally begins an experiment to cast his mind outwards into the celestial ether and understand the truth of the formation of gods. In one hand he holds a mirror, in the other a mystic staff inscribed with protective symbols. As he speaks the first words of his fateful experiment, the mirror no longer shows the reflection of the outer world, but something else. A gentle wind from the other place brushes across the mage's face. He collapses in the midst of his spell implements, drool leaking from the corner of his mouth as his pupils dilate, reduced to a gibbering wreck. He is only capable of speaking one phrase for the rest of his mortal life.
"It's coming."
The Soul of Balaphon withdraws as a faint blood mist from the nose of the corpse of the final fallen adventurer it had possessed to complete its deadly work. All of the villages in this lightly settled region are now dead, and it is time to move on. The still silence after the end of the screaming was something that brought annoyance to the Soul, and the long silences that intervened before new prey worth its attention could be found. But then, suddenly, its acute senses feel something else. A humanoid form, miles away, staring deep into a placid alpine pool. The Soul is curious, and confused, since it was certain it had killed all of the humans here. Oh well, one more.
The figure looks down at the pool, seeing its own reflection. It does not yet have words to describe what it sees, because it does not know words. It has never heard a word. It does, however, analyze and categorize the impressions of what it sees, sorting and understanding the meaning of objects and materials without the need for language. It understands that it exists, and that it has a purpose. The reflection looking back at itself is that of a sculpted stone statue, composed of dark blue metamorphic rock, like lapis lazuli, though it knows this not. As its emotions shift from contemplation to curiosity, seeing the reflected statue mirror its movements, the dark lapis changes to notes of white jade. As the color of the statue's face, and then body, changes, the stone swirls with the texture of mixing paint, or a drop of dye dripped into clear water.
The figure looks down at its hands, testing them by forming the hard, smooth white appendages into different shapes, and open palm and a fist. It caresses the water, the statue's color shifting back to deep blue when it sees that the water behaves in a different fashion from the air and the ground. Then, it turns. The color of the statue changes, as it senses the appearance of the Soul of Balaphon, snaking through the trees. It feels that something similar to itself has appeared. A being with a conscious mind. This causes the statue to feel a mixture of happiness, a gentle yellow citrine, and welcoming affection, a blush of rose quartz. The statue does not yet know that other beings do not express emotion by changing color, but by tones and gestures, so it simply stares at the new figure, shimmering.
The Soul of Balaphon practically convulses with pleasure as it sees the prey it has chanced upon, turning as it kneels by the side of the lake. Some sort of living construct! Perhaps a lost artifact created by a mage or a god, or a strange sort of new Chromakin...no matter. It will learn the truth once it has possessed this thing's mind and body. The carnage it could wreak with this construct under its control...the Body and Mind will be jealous indeed! Practically slavering as it imagines the construct's mighty fists punching through a town palisade, it swirls forward, clouding its vision, seeping into its ears and nose and attempting to possess whatever brain or controlling force animates it, as it has done with countless other helpless creatures for the glory of Nital.
The statue's colors turn to the bright green jade of surprise, as it feels its mind being entered by the Soul of Balaphon. Is this how communication is carried out between thinking beings? And then, all at once, darkness spreads across the statue’s form, as it realizes the intent of this creature after it touches its mind. To control it, and force it to do things that it would not do of its own will. Dark obsidian, shot through with angry lines of red, course across the form of the statue, as it feels anger and fury for the first time.
The Soul of Balaphon has possessed many creatures before. Animals with their primal desires of fear and hunger are easy to override with a few touches. Most humans are not much more complex, simply a few extra layers of ambition and faith to twist and break in predictable ways. Some of them give the Soul more challenge than others, but they always succumb in the end to the incessant whispers of the Voice of Nital. Others, like archmages or dragons, were more challenging, having constructed layers of mental defenses and countermeasures over the centuries, or chromarchs whose essences were well-suited for spiritual combat. These could hurt the Soul, perhaps even kill it. These were only to be attacked with care, and avoided otherwise.
From the outside, the construct’s mind appeared simple at first, like an animal, but the Soul realized its mistake as soon as it was inside. It was...beautiful and terrible. An immense machine, more powerful and complex than even the mind of an elder dragon of Vash. The soul was dragged deeper into its inner workings, and he felt its eyes upon him. Gentle hands combed through his memories, examining his experiences, from the moment of the bloody ritual that ripped Balaphon into three. The Soul screamed and struggled in frustration at this calm perusal of his mind, as the construct meticulously gathered all of the knowledge available to it, not harming him in the process.
"What are you?" hisses the voice of the Soul of Balaphon as it is expelled, violently, from the creature's mind, reeling from the intense psychic shock of meeting a being more powerful than itself. No, not just more powerful. Immense orders of magnitude more powerful. For the first time in centuries, the Soul of Balaphon feels an emotion approaching fear. "What...are you," repeats the statue slowly, testing its ability to speak. "I understand. It uses vibrations in the air..." The statue's texture changes to bright gold as it luxuriates in the feeling of mastery and control over this new tool of ‘language’.
“I...am balance,” says the statue, remaining gold as it understands pride. “Obligation. Control. Law.” It continues to speak the words slowly, testing their meaning, observing how its own mind changes in response to the statements of its purpose. The Soul of Balaphon slowly attempts to slither away as the statue speaks, then melting away back into the forest and fleeing for its life. The statue watches it run, and then gently bends its knees, and jumps. Propelled high into the air, it pursues the flawless trajectory of a calculated projectile before crashing down through the treeline several hundred feet away, landing in front of the Soul as it tries to dart in another direction. But the statue is faster than any mortal. To the Soul’s surprise the statue somehow manages to grasp its own ephemeral form in its hands.
The statue’s form is now luminescent diamond as it looks down at the Soul with firm determination. “You fear...destruction. Being taken to a place where you would not go.” Chains of the same glowing, diamond-like substance burst out of the ground, binding the writhing Soul of Balaphon as it hisses and rages, its formless form trapped. “Yet you do the same to others.” The statue considers its own purpose, the brilliant shining diamond slowly fading back to the cool lapis texture of contemplation. “Strange…”
“I BRING THE DREAD OF NITAL!” the Soul rages. “I WILL NOT BEG FOR MERCY!”
“I will not kill you, in return for an Obligation,” says the statue calmly.
“Neeeverrrrr,” hisses the Soul, loyal to the end.
“My obligation will not harm your master,” replies the statue.
The Soul considers its options. On one hand, it desperately does not wish to summon Nyubar here. If that occurred, there would be no negotiation. On the other hand, trusting the will of what could only be a rival god is an immense risk. But there was no doubting that the statue would end its existence if it refused. And it does not want to die.
The roiling blood-mist mass eventually calms into a relatively quiescent sphere. “What obligation?” it finally says.
“Do you accept?” says the statue.
“...yes.”
“Then the contract is made,” says the statue.
The Soul of Balaphon feels the chains tighten, and then vanish, as an intense compulsion to do the will of the statue fills its mind, like an unavoidable pressure, a driving wind that carries away all in its path.
“Take me to your other parts,” says the statue.
“We have not been united in centuries,” says the Soul.
“That does not matter.”
“What is your name?” says the Soul, convinced at last that this god will not kill it.
“A name…” the statue considers, its unchanging facial features a mask of lapis. It did not have name, so it chose one.
“You may call me Statute.”